The aim of this article is to impose solutions to the ethical dilemmas that derive from social work research involving vulnerable children. The main concern is how to balance the protection of children while progressing their participation. Several substitute mechanisms were put in place for protecting underage children. In particular, children were informed explicitly that participation was voluntary, they could pull out without risk of sanction, and their anonymity and confidentiality was guaranteed. However, anonymity did not prevent reporting the child abuse cases in line with the referral mechanism established for the current study. The MacArthur competence assessment tool for clinical research was used for measuring children’s competence to consent to research study. Only children with competence participated. Finally, the study highlighted the critical importance of providing research with vulnerable children considering the best interests of children in the absence of parental care.

本文的目的是强加解决因涉及弱势儿童的社会工作研究而引起的道德困境的方法。主要关注的是如何在促进儿童参与的同时平衡对儿童的保护。建立了一些替代机制来保护未成年儿童。特别是，明确告知儿童参与是自愿的，他们可以退出而不受制裁的风险，并保证了他们的匿名性和保密性。但是，匿名性并不能阻止根据当前研究建立的推荐机制举报虐待儿童案件。用于临床研究的麦克阿瑟能力评估工具用于测量儿童同意研究的能力。只有有能力的孩子参加。最后，